


The Brave and the Bold

by lynadyndyn



Series: World's Finest Series [2]
Category: Original Work
Genre: I was working fourteen hour days when I wrote this, M/M, ah for those halcyon days, also DC hadn't imploded yet, that is all the context you need
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-06-18
Updated: 2013-06-18
Packaged: 2017-12-15 10:07:53
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 18,777
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/848270
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lynadyndyn/pseuds/lynadyndyn
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The traditional Lucratiann form of romantic poetry was highly stylized. The closest similarity he had found on earth was the sonnet, but Zac didn't have much interest or talent at those either. Not that Stalker would have reacted well to receiving poetry, although that could be pretty hilarious on its own. If Zac was ever going to write anything about him it would have been an encyclopedia or a textbook, something where unembellished facts were laid down line after line with clinical precision.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Brave and the Bold

Zacir-Sto Fahn, crown prince of the Outer Lucratiann Empire, met his uncle Pat when he was equivalent to a human twelve years old, and it had ended him.

This wasn't such a bad thing. He still got homesick sure, all the time, but with the crumbling of that identity came literally an entire world of potential, tougher and grittier but vastly more interesting. Beacon was a much more substantial person than Zacir-Sto would have been. Besides Zac generally was a sunny kind of guy, blessed with a forgiving personality that was half short attention span. Still, he knew Pat felt responsible for his banishment and Zac might have been an exemplar of decency as his day job, but he was off the clock now. He was not above using guilt.

"Yeah, sure I'll adjust," he said. "I adjusted to _Earth_ in the first place and then I adjusted when you moved us from Titular City to hicksville and now I guess I'll adjust _again_."

Uncle Pat flushed, which was some small gratification, but quickly blustered his way over it. "High school isn't like moving again, Zac. It's a sign we're settling in. I was never comfortable with letting your schooling slide the way it had, and even with the tutors your education has really suffered. Besides, you should spend more time with people your own age."

"I do that plenty!" Zac said, clenching the edge of the table. Next to him, Susan gave him a measuring look and he made an effort to lessen his grip before the wood cracked. "I'm at the Commando Tower every weekend! I'm around other kids all the time!"

"You should spend more time with... regular kids," Pat amended. Zac didn't quite have a response to that. Stalker was the only non-powered human in the Commandos and he was still a long flight away from normal.

"I don't see why we had to move in the first place," he settled on complaining. "Titular City was great. Littleton is so boring! I don't care if you grew up here! There's nothing to _do_. Susan hates it too."

"You won't get any help from dragging me into this fight, squirt," Susan said, neatly dissecting her grapefruit. However that wasn't a disagreement.

"Susan is settling in," Pat said, sliding a covert gaze at her. He must have picked up on that too. "Her campaign for the local legislature is going very well and she's meeting all sorts of people. You feel stifled because you've chosen not to go out and engage with the other kids here. If you went to school, I bet you would be a lot happier."

"I feel _stifled_ because you won't let me do anything fun," Zac said. Pat flinched, so he kept going. "You won't even let me _fly_ around here! It's like... it's like you put me in a cage and now you put a little hamster wheel in the cage, expecting that to entertain me except that hamster wheel is a real _grind_."

Susan rolled her eyes at her plate and Pat lost some of his hang-dog expression. "A little over dramatic there, Zac," he said gently. "You know why that rule's in place. Flying around Titular City was dangerous but it was manageable. It's big enough and crowded enough there that we could get away with it. Living in Littleton though means we have to be careful. Everyone knows everyone, so blending in becomes a lot more important. It's a safety thing."

"You're _Paragon_!" Zac objected. "Even if you don't think _I_ can take care of myself, you're the most powerful thing on this stupid rock! I don't see why we have to hide all the time!"

"It's not hiding," Pat said, but he looked tired and a little irritated. "It's about fitting in with the people we protect."

Zac pushed himself away from the table. "Yeah, well, in case you haven't noticed, I don't fit in. And making me go to school will just make me look like even more of a freak."

Uncle Pat sighed and gave a commiserating look to Susan. She didn't return it; that was something, at least. "I'm going to be late for work," Pat said stiffly. "We'll talk about this more later."

"I can still go to the Commando Tower, right?" Zac asked, hating how he sounded little-kid doleful. "It's Friday."

"At five o'clock," Pat said. "Clear the stumps out of the field before you go, if you're determined not to enroll today. Might as well keep yourself useful."

"Yes, Patrick _sir_ ," Zac said. Pat looked like he wanted to say something angry, but instead he grit his teeth and strode off towards the hallway, shoulders tight.

Susan was looking at him, cool and speculative. She was dressed in one of her power suits; as a COO her wardrobe had always been echelons above what Pat could afford on a special ed teacher's salary. So far her major campaign strategy seemed to consist of wowing her potential constituency with Prada, and it was working. "What?" he asked her.

She held up her hands placating. "Don't take it out on me. I'm just an innocent bystander in this feud."

"You think I should go to school too though." Zac jammed his hands in his pockets to keep himself from kicking the chair into component parts. "Of course you do."

Susan shrugged. "To be honest, I think Pat places a little bit too much value on being normal. You're not a normal kid and most of those are shits, anyway. I don't know how much good it would do you to hang around them all day."

Zac looked up at her, barely daring to hope.

Susan got up, smoothing the creases out of her pencil skirt. "At the same time," she continued. "Your uncle is having a tough time right now and arguing with you every hour of the day isn't making it easier. You two don't always see eye to eye, but I think you should cut him a break. He loves you, after all."

Zac didn't have anything to say to that. He just clenched his own jaw and stared out the window.

Susan put her plate in the sink with a clatter, not rinsing it off. She ruffled his hair as she passed him on her way down the hall. "Remember to call and let us know when you've gotten to the Tower," she said. "And don't forget the stumps."

***

It was raining in Idaho. A fuzzy, sullen sort of rain that threatened to linger into the evening. It could have had the decency to hail, Zac thought glumly. That would have at least been interesting.

It was three-thirty and Zac had watched an America's Next Top Model marathon instead of doing anything about the stumps. Zac knew it was a mailman type of chore - expected in both rain and shine - but he figured he could maybe get away with faking memory lapse one more time before getting caught. It was totally unfair to begin with. Out of everyone on this planet, Uncle Pat should have been able to understand what a terrible calamity rain was for Lucratianns. Back home moisture was redistributed from the atmosphere artificially and the annual harvest of tiktik flowers was the only thing that fell from the sky. Rain was enervating in how tragic and gray it turned the world. Pat had probably just bucked-up through it as a kid though, the same way he diligently plowed through everything from the back forty to his students' learning disorders to a rogue comet.

The weather report said it wasn't raining in New Corum. Zac wasn't sure if he believed that; even when the sun was out, it was _metaphorically_ raining in New Corum, like a cartoon cloud in those anti-depressant commercials. Still, Zac reasoned, looking around to make sure Susan hadn't come how early from work, New Corum glum was an urban kind of glum. It definitely beat stumps. He opened the window and flew out.

Zac had nearly died of shock when it turned out that the name Stalker gave him had been googleable. But Elias Gossling had won a national essay contest in the fifth grade. It was about the revolutionary war and used words that Zac, who apparently would be enrolled as a junior, didn't know. Even so, Zac was pretty sure ten-year-old Eli had been phoning it in. It was a short trip from there to the phone book. And okay, Zac hit a moral juncture where it stopped being strictly laptop-based snooping, but what was the point of having one of the world's most tricked-out spy computer in the Commando Tower if he didn't use it when it mattered?

Even then, Zac half-assumed the address he found had to be a decoy. The first time he flew over to check it out he expected to find a compost heap or a giant sign that said NICE TRY, BEACON. But it was a real house, in a crowded row of identical houses. It was small and weather-beaten, the clapboard stained, and settled more into its foundations than realtors liked. It was in New Corum's East District, which the internet also told him was historically white and historically lower class, full of dock workers and prostitutes and other things that were unsavory and old-fashioned. Stalker casually used million dollar technology, but it occurred to Zac that maybe Eli didn't have that much money.

The traditional Lucratiann form of romantic poetry was highly stylized. The closest similarity he had found on earth was the sonnet, but Zac didn't have much interest or talent at those either either. Not that Stalker would have reacted well to receiving poetry, although that could be pretty hilarious on its own. If Zac was ever going to write anything about him it would have been an encyclopedia or a textbook, something where unembellished facts were laid down line after line with clinical precision. Not that Stalker would appreciate that either, but because if Zac was proud of anything it was how well he knew that little freak. He had dedicated hundreds of subconscious man hours to learning about him, hoarding away every new precious piece of information Stalker let drop. But it wasn't Stalker Zac saw now, making his heart jump in his throat. It was that Elias kid, walking home, and he was a new book entirely.

Zac landed on the roof and hid behind the crumbling chimney. Eli was ambling really, no great intent in his stride, slouched over as he walked. He had earbuds in and was holding a white plastic bag, the kind they give you at convenience stores. He was a whole mess of cognitive dissonance clattering around down there. Stalker, for instance, was almost never out of uniform. Even during off-time at the tower he would just remove the cape and the bulkier kevlar, leaving him in the bodysuit, which was great if distracting. When he went undercover he wore costumes, not clothes, whatever fit the situation best. Like an octopus, and the same sort of slippery too. Eli was dressed the opposite of streamlined; baggy jeans and a gray hoodie under a denim jacket. Stalker's hair was always dark and perfect with whatever, like, shellac he used on it, but Eli had that sandy nothing-colored hair, cut into kind of a shaggy side bang. Stalker only listened to boring classical stuff or, weirdly, sometimes very intellectual hip-hop. But Eli hinted at being almost _emo_ , which was equal parts disturbing and thrilling.

At least even Stalker wasn't paranoid enough to do anything to change his eye color when on the job. Eli still had those weird eyes, too yellow to be brown, but brown was still the best word for them. The effect was odd and compelling - Zac wasn't the only person on the team who liked it when Stalker took off his mask - but reassuring somehow now.

Eli took the stairs up to the door two at the time, humming as he fished his keys out of his pocket. At first it just sounded like nonsense, singing under his breath, but then Zac heard him say in a undercurrent to the melodious buzz, "Land in the backyard and walk around down the sidewalk if you're coming in."

Zac waited a couple minutes, partly to keep Elias fussing because he deserved to look like he didn't know which one was his house key but partly to let his blush die down, before landing behind the bushes in the backyard. He walked down the street, trying to keep casual, but when he raised a hand and said, "Hey!" it sounded straight out of a sitcom.

Eli looked up, pure surprise. "Hey!" he said, sounding pleased and taking out his earbuds. It wasn't quite Stalker's voice, but he couldn't say how. "How's it going, man? Don't see you much around here."

Zac nodded, feeling kind of like a duck. "Yeah, uh, well... I was in the neighborhood? I thought you..." He fished for a euphemism. "Might need a lift?"

"Cool, in a little while, yeah," Eli said. He opened the door and narrowed his eyes and _there_ was Stalker, looking pretty mad. "I got some chores I need to deal with first. You wanna come in?"

The answer was yes and no, but the no was a little squirming worry compared to the cavalcade of yes. What could an environment that created Stalker possibly look like? Zac skipped up the stairs, remember to make each foot land firmly on the brick, and flashed Eli a smile that made him flicker his gaze away. "Sure, man."

The inside was small too, the cluttered neatly organized the way it was for people who had standards but not a lot of time or a maid. Not anything impressive but definitely, almost achingly normal, from the flowery slipcover on the couch to the beige carpet to the trophies on the shelf. "Ma, I'm home," Eli called out, moving into the little yellow and avocado kitchen and putting his bag on the table. He went right to the fridge and opened it. Zac's view of him was blocked by the door. "You want anything to drink?"

"I'm good," Zac said. There were Christmas cards on the fridge, stuck there with alphabet-shaped magnets.

"We have Sprite," Eli said, and Zac realized he was kind of nervous. "And orange juice and water. And lemonade, but it's just Country Time."

"Really okay, but thanks," Zac said. "So you saw me... around?"

Eli shut the door with a _thwak_ , holding a carton of milk. He was definitely glaring now. "All three times. It's really not that wide of a chimney."

"Oh. Uh..." Zac said. "One percent, huh?"

Eli rolled his eyes, and it occurred to Zac that Stalker maybe did that _all the time_ , just no one could see, but Zac was saved from whatever he was going to say when a woman came down the stairs. She looked like Eli. There was more years lining her face than maybe her age alone was responsible for and she was shorter and heavier, but she had the same sharpness to her chin and nose. Her eyes glossed over Eli and landed on Zac. "Honey. Who's your friend?"

"This is Zach. Zach Stone," Eli said. He looked casual if you didn't notice his white knuckle grip on the carton. "We're in A.P. Physics together."

Zac did his best to look like someone who would take A.P. Physics. "It's a pleasure to meet you, Mrs. Gossling."

Eli went still the way Stalker did when he was the first to see a threat, but his mother's smile only briefly faltered. She patted her hair. "It's Ms. Jacobs, actually. But just call me Diane."

Zac grinned from under his hair as rakishly as he knew how. "Then it's _definitely_ a pleasure to meet you, Diane."

Diane smiled back. It made her look younger and prettier. "You should bring home your friends more often, Eli," she said. "I worry when you don't. What ever happened to that girl who used to come over, whatshername?"

"Heather," Eli said. He jerked his chin defiantly when Zac gave him a look.

"Heather," Diane repeated, nodding the confirmation. "I liked her. Did you get my smokes when you were out?"

"They're in the bag," Eli said. He busied himself getting out a glass and avoiding Zac's eyes. It wasn't like Zac hadn't known Stalker had dated Null - Zac had gone out with Silver when they were thirteen, although at the time he had thought they were just in the primary stage of the _jurksha_ ritual - but he definitely didn't think Stalker would have ever brought her home.

"Lites," Diane complained, looking at the carton. "You know I don't smoke these."

"Well you should," Eli said. "Because they're better for you. Not as much as quitting, but a little better."

"You and your smart mouth," Diane said, but there was nothing mean in it. Eli ducked his head and grinned a little. She pounded the carton against her hand idly as she turned to Zac. "Are you staying for dinner?"

"Yes!" Zac said immediately.

"Zac just came to drop off some stuff we need for a project," Eli said. "I'm not gonna be here for dinner anyway. I have that seminar. We need to go upstairs now."

"They work you kids too hard," Diane said. She sounded a little disappointed. "Nice to meet you, Zach. Stop by anytime."

"Oh I _will_ ," Zac said, but Elias was already moving and he had to jog a little to follow suit. He got a better look at the trophies on his way up. _Michael Gossling_ on all of them, engraved in cheap metal.

Eli's room was up the stairs and must have been under the eaves of the house, the ceiling slanted so abruptly. The bed was unmade and there were posters on the wall of two year old action movies. All in all, it was underwhelming. He hadn't known what to expect, exactly, but this was downright generic. It was like Stalker had decorated his bedroom based on data he collated from Hardy Boys novels, which was sad and probably close to the truth.

"Dude," Elias hissed once the door was closed. At least that sounded natural. "Don't hit on my _mom_."

"I can't believe that's your mom," Zac said, sitting on the rumpled little bed. Stalker _slept_ here.

Eli crossed his arms and drew himself up to his full height, making Zac really aware for the first time how much he had been slouching. Before he had just looked like a kid, but now he looked more like Stalker around the eyes, all that quick intelligence and weary capability. Zac could almost see the cape. "Why's it hard to believe that's my mom?"

Zac shrugged. "I don't know. She's just so normal."

Eli huffed out a breath. "That's a matter of opinion." He pulled out the desk chair and sat down, something about his muscles a little too tense for it to be a natural sprawl. Pretty much every other time Zac had seen this boy he had been literally armored; even naked he generally had a contingency plan. This was a gift, Zac knew, Stalker willingly, if passively, exposing this part of himself. This was Stalker stripped to the essentials; a pretty, awkward, smart kid who slept in a small bedroom in a big city. Zac grinned.

Eli looked concerned. "What?"

"Nothing," Zac said. Eli didn't seem convinced. Zac grabbed his wrist, pulled him gently onto his lap. Eli made a little disgruntled noise but settled in with his typical fluid grace. Stalker's refined athleticism could still take him by surprise. Zac smiled up at him, feeling the rush in his gut that meant his nimbus was flaring. He cupped a hand around Eli's neck, rubbing. "Man, it's good to see you. You would not believe the day I've been having."

Eli smiled crookedly. "Let me guess. You stubbed your toe? Someone made fun of your hair?"

"Why would anyone make fun of my hair?" Zac wondered and pulled Elias down into a kiss.

The first few times they had done this they had both been angry, or about to die, or frantic with jubilation because of their survival. It had taken a good month before Zac learned Stalker could kiss like it wasn't a fighting technique. That was good sometimes, being kissed like Stalker was barely restraining himself from devouring him. But this was nice too, savoring the warm, wet motion of Elias' mouth, like they had an untold lifetime to get to something more.

They hadn't had sex since getting back together. They hadn't had that much sex before they broke up, because Stalker turned out to be uptight and virginal, and man, that had been like walking through a minefield, navigating Stalker's control issues. And Zac had been too much of a wreck to go out and get laid during their hiatus. Twenty minutes until they were expected at the Tower. This wasn't the sort of situation where Stalker ever appreciated a quickie, so he was sneaking a hand down Elias' waistband and guiltily toying with the idea of convincing him that Lutractianns can physically die of blueballs, when the comm went off for both of them.

Elias leaned back, color high in his cheeks and breathing hard. He looked down regretfully at Zac's mouth and put a hand to his ear. "Falconette? Yeah. Yeah, I'm with Beacon. No, we're still on the ground. No, I haven't - hang on, incoming call. Pythia?"

Zac switched on his own comm, clearing his throat. "Beacon here."

"Dude." It was Sterling and he sounded unhappy. "You need to get over here."

Zac looked down mournfully at his erection. "No worries. It'll take us ten minutes to get to the Tower. What's up?"

"No, not the Tower," Brian said. "The satellite."

"Code Black," Elias said, getting off Zac's lap, which somehow felt heavier for the absence. "Unfamiliar spacecraft sighted heading for earth. All available capes are requested at Society of Righteousness headquarters."

Zac flopped back on the bed with a groan, starring at the ceiling beams. "I tell you. The day I am having."

****

It turned out, and he was clearly not happy revealing this information, that Stalker kept a uniform in a mechanized password-coded compartment built into his closet. This raised a colony of questions on its own: Who had built it? How had Elias kept his mom from noticing the construction? What sort of seminar did she think he spent every weekend at anyway? But Stalker was already pretty tense. Zac had never gotten confirmation out of him, but he suspected teleporting to the satellite made him queasy. Besides, this was Stalker's second meeting since rejoining the team and not all the hurt feelings had gotten smoothed over just yet. Any chink in unity would only be wedged open further on the satellite. The space cases - capes who lived and operated primarily on the satellite - were scurrying around prepping, but most everyone else just stood on the viewing deck, waiting. No one paid any attention when they zapped in.

It was why they had started the Commandos in the first place, Zac thought as he followed Elias to where the rest of the team stood in front of the display monitor in an uneasy clump among all the older capes. The Commandos mostly all had mentors and they were all learning, but without a solid front they were still usually sent to sit at the kids table during a crisis situation. Working together lent them all more weight.

Falconette smiled at them before returning her attention to the screen, her wings fluttering anxiously. "It was spotted forty minutes ago. It's already been leaked to the press."

"Wonderful," said Stalker. The Wielder glared at him, tossing The Blade, which had manifested today as a crooked dagger, hand to hand. Stalker gave him a flat, assessing look and went to stand over by Silver. The two of them began whispering.

"Hey," Zac said, sotto voiced to the Wielder. "Maybe now's not the time, okay?"

The Wielder shrugged. Besides Stalker, Graham was probably Zac's best friend but the guy could hold a grudge. It was a pretty standard character trait for psychics. "I'm still being professional."

Zac gave up on conflict resolution and searched for Paragon. He found him over by the central control panel, deep in terse conversation with Nightmare and the Amazonian. He glanced over in Zac's direction and gave him a distracted and weak smile. The small laugh lines around his eyes made him look old, sort of sage. Zac never quite saw the moment when the ripple happened and his Uncle Pat turned from well-meaning but ineffectual into the unofficial leader of the world. Zac smiled back, relieved. He caught the eye of the Amazonian and gave her a wink because he was pretty sure he was biologically incapable of not doing that.

"Any visuals yet?" Stalker asked, loud enough for the rest of the Commandos to hear.

"They're coming in range soon," Nightmare said. Stalker's eyes widened a little, but then again he always seemed a little too surprised that Nightmare kept him in his radar. Although Zac himself would do his best to forget about it if he were in Nightmare's constant periphery because the guy was _unsettling_ , Stalker never indicated they had anything but a solid working relationship. "We know it's a fleet though. No less than thirteen cruiser-class ships, we know that much."

"Does the satellite have the weaponry to combat that?" The Amazonian asked.

"Let's hope we don't have to find out," Silver muttered. Stalker nodded. His cape was pulled closed around him. Zac went back to watching the claustrophobic infinity of space through the satellite's viewing panels.

"Visual in five," The Blue Peril said. And then they were on screen with a little blip as the digital reading settled, twelve white scout ships flying in formation around the silver tanker in the middle. They were all more circular than most spacecrafts the Society ran into, certainly more elegant than anything humans had yet produced. Zac never really liked the cylindrical nature of most Earth space shuttles. After all, as his old tutors had taught him, the circle was mathematics perfected and Lucratianns strove for perfection in all things.

"Have they hailed us?" Zac heard Paragon ask.

"Not yet," the Blue Peril said. "All channels are open."

"They won't just yet," Zac heard himself say. He was certain of himself, the way you feel in dreams. Around him, capes looked at him in surprise but he took a step forward to get a better view. "Zoom in on the southeast section of the hull."

Blue Peril looked at Nightmare. Nightmare turned to his left. "Paragon?"

Paragon frowned briefly at Zac, all genuine curiosity. Zac had a wildly paranoid moment before remembering of course Uncle Pat wouldn't know. He left Lutracia when he was a baby and had only been back twice, during which time no one would have been dumb enough to show him the carrier ships.

"Please," Zac said to Paragon.

Paragon furrowed his brow at Zac for a moment but seemed satisfied by what he saw. "Do it."

The moniter zoomed in, displaying a crest. The crimson of it sparkled in empty space, the stylized twining of a _mroner_ bird around an arrow.

"They're not warships," Zac said. The words were hard to get out; they wanted to stay lodged in his chest. "That's the royal Lucratiann crest. The scouts all have military-grade weaponry but that one, it's not armed."

"Beacon," Paragon said, surprised, maybe a little alarmed. Zac saw Stalker draw himself up to his full height like a string pulled tight.

The satellite's transmitter beeped, a chiming little beep. It was sound he had half-forgotten and felt off-center to remember. A tinkling androgynous voice said, "Well me, . This is the Royal Flagship _Fahniree_ of the Lucratiann StarForce. We have come on a mission of non-aggression to contact-"

"I'm here," Paragon said, crossing his arms. "Telar-Ere Fahn, born to the royal house of Fahn. State your purpose."

There was politely annoyed silence on the other end before the voice said, "Well met, former son of Fahn. But we seek another. Your ward, Crown Prince Zacir-Sto Fahn, son of Col-Suran Sto, 128th Emperor of the Greater Lutractiann Empire."

There was a stir around them, a sea of people finally shocked out of silence. Falconette instinctively wrapped one of her wings around Zac. He brushed his way out of it as gently as he could with a shaky arm. He felt like he might throw up. Zac looked at Paragon, but Paragon had nothing for him but startlement. Zac crossed his own arms. "Yeah, I'm here," he said. "But that crown prince stuff, you gotta update your Wikipedia page, dude. I haven't been that for a long time."

Another puase, during which the senior members of the Society looked at each other, uneasy and evaluating. Finally another transmission came through. "This unworthy one most humbly requests that his Excellency board our vessel in order to grant us an audience. His majesty, your most excellent father, is dead. There is much to discuss."

***

Zac had had seventeen attendants back when he was a prince, each of whom had assistants of their own. Over the course of his childhood he had had royally designated nurses, tutors, playmates and Mifann-Wi, although she hadn't been on the payroll. His father was more the holopainting in his playroom, the crest over his bed; an ideal or a symbol, worthy of respect and love in that regard. If you had asked yesterday, Zac would have said his strongest memories of his father were of his own sentencing, which still had all the surreal clarity of a vivid nightmare.

When he was a kid, though, Zac would be dressed up in his best robes and escorted to the assembly room, where his father would take him on his knee. "Here's my little politician," he would say, tweaking Zac's ears. "My little warrior."

"We can't let him go," Paragon was saying now. "It's probably a trap, and even if it isn't, they won't have anything to say we need to hear."

"You're suggesting we ignore them?" The Amazonian said. "They're claiming peace, but when have the Lutracianns not had their hands on a sword when saying that?"

"They came here on a pleasure cruiser!" Paragon said.

"It might not be armed," Nightmare said. "But those scout ships are. Whatever emissary they sent, they're protecting them."

"But still-"

"Paragon," Zac said. He wasn't loud but the observatory went quiet as if to accommodate him. "I'm going."

Paragon looked at him like he had forgotten Zac was there. "Beacon. This is going to be dangerous."

"I don't care," Zac said. "I need to know what happened to my dad."

Paragon's eyes went big and then the expression compressed, his mouth flattening into a thin line. "All right," he said, and Zac could have hit him for how gentle he was trying to be. "But you're not getting on that thing by yourself. I'm coming with you."

"Me too," Stalker said, materializing by Zac's elbow. Zac jumped but Stalker was totally immobile, the perfect little soldier.

Nightmare grunted, doing something most likely very important to the control panel. "Which means I'm coming too." He addressed Paragon as, so far as he was aware, Nightmare had never spoken to Zac directly. "You'll need more back-up. Someone capable of keeping a cool head."

Paragon didn't seem thrilled and even through his daze Zac found it kind of funny that Pat got annoyed when a human accused him needing help, even Nightmare. At first, Zac had serious fantasies of throttling Stalker for his suggestions, especially when they were unilaterally useful. Maybe that was genetic, teeth on edge about a best friend who was always right.

Stalker was still doing his gargoyle imitation as the transport system was being prepared, but Zac caught him eying him, an insecure little twinge to his mouth. He looked away guiltily when he noticed Zac staring. How brilliant and terrifying was that, that they had stumbled themselves into a situation even Stalker hadn't anticipated?

***

It took a moment to adjust after the particle reconfiguration, but Zac didn't need to get his bearings to know they had been sent to the atrium. The air felt like warm breath. They were far enough away from the endless waterfalls of the walls that the green water just created a gentle murmur. The orange canopy of the intertwining branches of the dark _Leracar_ trees swayed in the artificial wind.

Stalker landed on his feet but needed to brace himself against Zac. A blue _turl-whirl_ landed on Stalker's shoulder, head cocked as it investigated all his strange smells. Zac figured why not and snuck in a quick grope as he shooed it off. Stalker gave him an awesomely indignant look.

"Clear," Nightmare said, and Zac jumped away, in case he meant _your gay affair is_. Deflowering Nightmare's protege probably wasn't the best thing he could do for his health, or Uncle Pat's for that matter. Pat tried to be understanding about certain aspects of native Lucratiann society, but he was profoundly and fundamentally from Idaho. "Scanner's not picking up any weaponry."

From a thicket of trees, a cabal of blue robes glided towards them. Within ten feet, the royal radius, they collapsed to the floor as one, foreheads meeting the ground. "Excellency," the one leading the formation, a voice Zac would have known anywhere. "We are honored to be in your most exalted presence. Forgive this unworthy one, as I have-"

"God, just skip it," Zac said, as Stalker raised his eyebrows incredulously. Zac had had daydreams like this, but none of them involved him feeling this irritated. "Will you get up, Uncle Owei?"

Owei looked up. He had grown a beard, pretty much the same color as his skin, and his hair was longer and top-knotted. He looked like a cross between a samurai and Obi-Wan Kenobi, which, if he were capable of understanding those references, would have been what he had been going for. He looked younger than he had when Zac was twelve, when - as the youngest of his uncles - Owei had still seemed impossibly old.

"As his excellency wished," Owei said, a little belligerently. He stood up, robe pooling around his feet. Owei spared a look at Paragon, twitching up the corner of his lip in a delicate sneer. "Telar."

"Owei-Bal," Paragon said, measured. He was stalwart again, hands clenching and unclenching, gun powder lining the pathway of a zen garden. "What is this about?"

Owei lowered his gaze. "This concerns Zacir alone."

"Anything you can say to me, you can say in front of them." Another bird landed on Zac's shoulder this time and started to preen. Zac did his best to ignore it.

Owei curled his mouth up sourly. "As you desire. Your honored father, the great emperor, is dead."

Again, Zac was oddly indifferent about the information, like it was so big it had pushed out his capacity to feel. "How?" His voice was more upset than he was.

The wording crawled across Owei's face before it making it out into the open. "With dignity," he said. "He was challenged and he faced his opponent with honor as a great man should."

Stalker, who wouldn't know honor if it bit him, who was the master of clawing a dude in the junk and running away, took a step closer to Zac. They weren't quite touching, but it magnetized the air between them in a comforting way.

"He lost a duel?" Zac asked.

"Yes, your Excellency."

"To who?"

"Who do you think it could be, Zacir?" came from behind them. It hit like a jumper cable, like being smothered to death with a nursery blanket. It was voice he still dreamed about, sometimes.

He turned around and there she was, older but the same. "Mom?"

Marialle wasn't in quite her finest gown, the crystal one, but it was beautiful even dyed mourning blue. She would always be beautiful. Her eyes were wet and warm. "Zacir. Oh, my baby. Oh, you've gotten big."

" _Mom_ ," Zac choked out, trembling towards her. He reached out and then he was enveloped in her, face buried in her dress like he was five and Mifann-Wi had hurt his feelings. He was taller than her now, though. How could he be taller than her? She was larger than the world. She smelled like always, like lotion and ink. "Mom."

She stroked his hair. "It's so good to see you, my little bird. You don't know how much I've missed you."

"You didn't come," Zac said, muffled and wet. "To the sentencing. You didn't even _come_."

"I was so weak," she said. "My pride and joy was being cast off with that traitor and I would never see you again. I couldn't watch. I couldn't bear it. You don't know how I've regretted that. Forgive me, my baby."

Zac sniffled. "Uncle Pat's not a-"

"This is touching," Nightmare said dryly, and oh god _Nightmare was watching_. Zac sprang away. "But we still don't know what's going on here." Nightmare and Stalker were looking at him with nearly identical expressions, like wistfulness was leaving a bad taste in their mouths. Paragon just looked angry.

Marialle glided over, taking his large hand in hers. "Telar. Brother. You and your friends are welcome here too. Bad blood may have been between us before, but in these times the House of Fahn needs all the allies it can have."

"What's going on, Marialle?" Paragon asked, clipped.

Marialle turned back to Zac, smiling soft and serene. Zac felt his insides quake. "It's time for Zacir to come home."

"Really?" Zac said at the same time Paragon said, "I don't know what you're playing at here this time, Marialle, but-" and Stalker said, "He _is_ home." It was only the last she paid attention to.

"Who's this?" she asked, turning to Stalker, sweetly fascinated.

Stalker nodded like John Wayne. She wasn't the first alien queen he had met. "You can call me Stalker, your excellency."

"What a pretty one," she cooed to Zac over Stalker's head. "Is he your _jurgash_?"

Zac's answer to that depended precisely on how much Lucratiann he was betting Paragon knew. Words like _jurgash_ were uncommon but notable. "Err," he settled on.

His mother seemed to take this answer as it was and tweaked Stalker's ear, which okay, that was pretty great. "Well, Mifann-Wi will have company then. She's here too and so looking forward to seeing you again, Zacir."

"She left Lucratia?" Zac asked, amazed.

Marialle sighed, shaking out her hair. "It wasn't safe for her there unsupervised. We're in desperate times, my morning bird. Come with me. Your entourage as well. We'll need to sit to discuss this."

Owei and his attendants led them out of the atrium, down the circular and warmly-lit corridors. Lucratiann design was structured around refined intuition and even the passages in the shuttle were soothingly intimate in their sense of enclosure. Zac was pretty sure they were going to a conference room. It shocked him that he could remember the layout to the ship so well; it shocked him that he had ever forgotten.

Stalker fell into step beside him and again Zac was very aware of the spaces where they weren't touching. "What's a _jurgash_?"

"It's cultural?" Zac tried weakly. Hopefully they would be hit by a meteor before they could keep having this conversation.

Stalker raised an eyebrow. And bullshit he didn't have psi powers. Zac had seen him break professional assassins with that move.

"Look, it's just... a thing. And it's really important to stress that it's a thing you're _not_ , even a little bit."

"Beacon," Stalker said, in that voice that half made Zac feel like he was five and half really turned him on.

Zac gave up. "I guess the literal translation is something like... official... royal mistress?"

Stalker, for the briefest moment, faltered in his stride. When he resumed walking it was with the stiff and affronted dignity of a wounded tiger, his cape drawn tight around him. The real irony was that everything in him that would be mad about this would also make him a really exceptional _jurgash_.

"Look, I said you're _not_ one," Zac said desperately. "And anyway, it's a great honor! People train! For _years_."

"I'm never talking to you again," Stalker said. But that was just posturing; he added a second later. "Is that what Mifann-Wi is?"

And that was a whole other galaxy of complicated. "Not... exactly."

Marialle had heard this, somehow, like she had always heard everything, before. "Mifann-Wi? Yes, I've rung for her. She'll be meeting us. Don't worry, Zacir, even during your banishment she remained a faithful fiance. She's stood by you in spirit all these years."

Stalker stopped abruptly, like a circuit had shorted in his brain. One of Owei's assistants nearly ran into him. Zac saw his hand twitch towards his belt compartment with the smoke bombs; he was just glad Stalker hadn't yet worked out the covers to the ceiling vents. Zac had a feeling in his stomach like he had just swallowed yeast.

"I can explain," he murmured as they were ushered through a door.

"Don't," Stalker said acidly. "Looks like she's here to do it for you."

And indeed, when Zac hadn't been paying attention the room had filled, all the attendants sitting around the table at the end. And Mifann-Wi, perfectly posed, was standing hands clasped in the middle. It wasn't that Zac couldn't recognize her, that wasn't the jolt of shock. But the wide-set eyes and the straw-straight hair had turned beautiful while he had been away when before they were just the identifying markers of his best friend. Zac stepped out of sync with Stalker and croaked, "Hey."

She let out a little sound, overcome and blissful, and ran towards him, skirts swirling. Zac caught her more than held her, but there was definitely a point where it turned into a hug.

"Zacir," she said. God, she was _tiny_ , bird-boned under her clothes. "Oh _Zacir_. I missed you so much."

"It's good to see you too," he settled on, trying to stay honest.

She drew back, biting her lip and drinking him in. "I never believed them, Zacir. I knew you couldn't have committed treason. Not my Zacir. I never listened to any of that talk, believe me."

"Uh well," Zac said. "I _did_ technically-"

Marialle sighed, bring a hand to her chest. "It does my heart good, this reunion. Even in my grief I can see hope."

Paragon muttered something darkly to Nightmare, who nodded. Stalker, Zac couldn't immediately see, his dark colors lost in the sea of blues. Dating Stalker was like trying to hand feed a chipmunk, and the past thirty seconds had probably undone eight months of battering away at his trust issues. So that was awesome.

Zac turned back to Mifann-Wi. She'd been as close as his right hand, once, and he had somehow not thought about her in years. He could at least dredge up a smile.

She cupped his face. "Together we'll rebuild Lucratia. I just know it."

Zack frowned, cheek twitching against her hand. "I don't understand. Why do we have to?"

"Sit down," Owei said, gesturing to the table. "All of you. Even you, Telar."

"Thanks," Paragon said dryly, pulling out a chair. Zac smiled awkwardly at Mifann-Wi again and went to sit next to him, trying to catch his eye. Paragon was staring at Marialle like he expected her to attack. He could not be more embarrassing sometimes; Zac was scandalized. He slouched into a sulk in his chair. He had forgotten how much more comfortable they were built at home.

Marialle was all grace, as always, and simply smiled at Paragon like the brother she had missed. Etiquette had always been very important to her; she always lectured his tutors about it when Zac was out of line. "Ever since Col's assassination, the Lucratiann royal house has been crumbling into disrepair."

"I thought you said he had lost a duel," Nightmare said.

"He was challenged by Hren-Gared Sto," Owei said. Zac sat up straighter with a small involuntary gasp. Owei noticed. "Yes, your excellency. He returned."

"Hren could never have won that challenge fairly," Marialle said. "All good citizens of Lucratia know it must have been sabotage. It was as good as an assassination by any measure. And now he's claiming right to the throne."

"I'm sorry, who?" asked Paragon.

"My uncle," Zac explained. He didn't know what to do when Paragon looked obliquely hurt so he kept going. "On my other side. One of my father's... my father's brothers. Younger brother. He's an asshole."

"How many uncles do you _have_?" Stalker muttered, from where he had been apparently sitting two seats down from him this entire time. He was studying Mifann-Wi like he was planning an autopsy, and she kept smiling at him nervously.

"Fourteen," said Zac.

"Some better than others," Owei said, to Paragon. Paragon narrowed his eyes. "And Hren is the worst of them all. He's been planning for years to place himself on the throne."

"Usurping the throne's apparently the national pastime," Paragon said. Zac could have hit him.

"The House of Fahn is collapsing," Marialle said. She bowed her head, and the words were matter-of-fact and apocalyptic. "And Zacir is the only one who can shore it up again."

"Your Excellency," Owei said. "It's time to come home and assume your place as Emperor. The people have not forgotten you, we all feel your banishment was undeserved. They would rally behind you. Lead Lucratia to greatness once again."

Beside him, Paragon breathed in sharply. Stalker stopped staring at Mifann-Wi.

"It's not my place," Zac said numbly. "Being emperor, it's not my place. I was disinherited."

"You're still Col's son!" Mifann-Wi said leaning forward, with the passion of an acolyte. "He never had another! You have more right to the throne than anyone!"

Marialle reached over, took his hand in hers. "You're forgiven, Zacir," she said gently. "You can come home now."

The brand of their family crest had faded on her palm. It matched the shade of a blush now, when before it had been the color of the ground on Mars or drying blood. Zac was already on Earth on the day he turned fifteen and would have had his own branding ceremony. He had gone out for pizza with the rest of the Commandos and when he came home Pat and Susan had waiting for him a copy of Grand Theft Auto San Andreas, although Pat hated the franchise, tickets to a Lakers game and Dave Matthews' autograph. He never thought he would touch his mother again; Zac used to wake up in the middle of the night feeling stabbed by that certainty.

"It's not that easy," he heard himself saying.

Marialle's face went puzzled. "Zacir?"

It had been so long since anyone had even said his name correctly, put that syllibant twist in the middle. "Uncle P - Telar. Paragon adopted me. Legally. It would look bad if I just up and left. And I'm like him - I'm a hero here. I'm on a team. They need me."

"We heard," Owei said sourly. "Paraboy."

" _Beacon_ ," Zac said. "Anyway, I've got a life here too. I don't know if I can just give it up."

"What are you talking about? I don't understand. You have a responsibility to your people!" Mifann-Wi said. She was always the more enthusiastic civics student. "You're needed at home."

Zac stared at the grain of the table. He didn't dare look anywhere else. "I have responsibilities here too."

Mifann-Wi bit her lip. "My birthday was last month. When you come back we can get married."

"No," Marialle said, sounding somehow both abrupt and kind. She tilted his chin up to meet her eyes and they were sad but accepting. "I understand. Of course you would feel conflicted, you have such a big heart, little bird. You don't want to abandon your friends here. Take a few days and think it over." She tweaked his ear and gave him a brave smile. "Get some closure. I'm sure you'll make the right decision."

"Thanks," Zac said, his voice cracking.

Paragon stood up, knocking his chair back. He said, overtly loud. "We should go. Come on, Beacon."

Zac watched Nightmare and Stalker get up, feeling abruptly out of step. The impact of all this information was delayed but potent and he was almost a little dizzy. He looked over his shoulder, where the rest of the Lucratianns - and why was he thinking of them as Lucratianns instead of Nightmare and Stalker as humans - were clustering together for little conferences. Mifann-Wi was staring at her lap, blinking hard. "But-"

Paragon glared at him. " _Now_."

Zac slunk up, scowling. "Fine. _Sir_."

"Perhaps Zacir should stay for dinner," Marialle suggested diplomatically. "You're all invited, of course."

Paragon crossed his arms. "If it's all the same to you, I'd prefer to go the rest of the night without being poisoned."

"Dude!" Zac said, shocked, sneaking a look at Owei, who was doing his best to seem unruffled.

"I'm sorry, your Excellency," Stalker said to Marialle. Zac was sure he would like her if he got to know her, wouldn't be this cool and efficient. "But Beacon has a prior engagement. I'm sure you understand."

"It doesn't matter either way," Paragon said. He jerked his head. "We're going."

Zac didn't look behind him when he filed out behind the others. He remembered that Earth story about the salt.

***

The Commando Tower was shaped liked a Erlenmeyer Flask turned on its head. It was paneled in blue-green glass, giving it something of a glossy, aquatic feel high above the city, extravagently and ruthless urban as it twinkled to itself in the sunlight. Stalker had commissioned an architect whose skyscrapers littered Dubai, making him sign at least seventeen non-disclosure agreements and refusing to let anyone in his firm touch the security measures. The Tower only had one elevator, a huge freight contraption that groaned and creaked its way up one hundred and forty seven flights. None of the Commandos used it themselves; it was for tourists only, the twice a year the Tower was open to the public as a show of good faith and publicity. It was the best solution the Society could manage, since the satellite was too expensive for anyone but the upper echelons of the U.N. to reach on any sort of regular basis. The Commandos themselves hated it, both because they were pawns in a decision made over their heads and it meant they had to massively clean every December and May.

Right now it was March, which meant the Tower was littered with pizza boxes and frosting cans, in the lounge at least. The clutter never quite made its way to the control room. But the lounge was a concession to their inevitable downtime and the most impressive piece of equipment in it was the PS3, which stood menacingly on its side next to the egg crate propping up the TV. Stalker and Falconette had spent a lazy Saturday afternoon modding it once, so now it somehow played Wii games and had a CNN news scroll running constantly on the bottom of the screen.

The headlines today were all about the Lucratiann spaceship hovering in the atmosphere, dour like a manatee. Zac had difficulty concentrating and Graham kept beating him at Mariokart, even when he switched to Bowser out of pity. Graham was wearing a shirt that said SHADY GREENS SUMMER CAMP 2005 and he and Brian were both making faces but not at the TV.

"Okay," Brian said, his accent making the word more musical and less doubtful than he was probably trying to convey. "So they're saying basically 'whups, our bad! Come back and be king'?"

"Emperor," Zac corrected moodily. He lounged back against the cushion. "Lucratia rules one eighth of its home galaxy."

"And you didn't tell them no?" Graham said, knocking Toad out with a blue shell. "Aw yeah! I would have told them no. That's a lot of pressure. Being kind of responsible for a small city in North America is enough for me as is."

Zac was tempted to say a couple things, but all of them were pretty arrogant. Graham's powers were weird and entirely contingent on the mystical sword he was bonded to, but Zac never held Graham being Graham against him. "Well you suck," he decided on, losing again.

"Seriously though," said Graham, eyes on his victory lap. "You're not going to do it, right?"

"I said I didn't know," Zac said. He looked around the room like that would make the rest of his team appear. Stalker and the girls had pretty much vanished once they had come back from the flagship, and Zac had only an uneasy array of guesses as to what they were doing. "It was my home. These people raised me. I'm kind of obligated."

Brian raised his eyebrows so they nearly met his equally white hair and said. "Uh, Zac, not to be rude or anything, but didn't they _exile_ you?"

Zac paused a moment to consider and selected Baby Peach this time. "Yeah."

"Why?" Graham asked. "Didn't you help Paragon or something?"

Telar was supposed to be dead. Owei kept repeating that to Zac's father, when Zac overheard them in the palace library, like the emphasis itself corrected the mistake. Telar was supposed to have died over thirty years ago, jettisoned off into space with the trash as an infant and no threat to the throne. Having him come back, even accidentally on his part, as the sovereign hero of some backwater planet was no good, no good at all. Even having him languishing drugged in the holding pen scheduled for execution the next morning would only go so far to correct the publicity damage.

Even at twelve, Zac had known the access codes to the prison compound. And instinctively, somehow, despite a lifetime of worshiping his family dictum like a sun god, Zac knew that this man who was suddenly his uncle but laughed more than any of his other uncles, who hugged Zac in the gardens and told him he was crying because he was so thankful to finally learn he wasn't alone, would never come to Lucratia with the intent to kill anybody.

"I helped him show my planet that our government was totally corrupt." He threw down the controller. "I don't want to play anymore. Brian, your game."

Stalker wasn't in his room. The bed was made with clinical precision, which wasn't any sort of clue as to whether he had been there recently. Stalker was OCD like it was a competitive sport. He hadn't said a word to Zac since leaving the ship. Zac tried Parvati's room instead, knocking on the door when he heard the rustling of people inside. After a minute, the door opened a thin sliver and Parvati poked just her head out, her own white hair up in a messy bun. "What?"

Zac cleared his throat. "Is Stalker there?"

She checked behind her before answering. She let the door open slightly more, revealing only Teresa, wingless, holding a pint of Ben and Jerry's. "No."

Parvati wasn't much of a liar, and the catch in her voice most likely meant Stalker had been there seconds before Zac knocked, but was now either clinging to the exterior of the building or somewhere in the ventilation system. Zac sighed. "Great. Well if he comes back, let him know I'm looking for him, okay?"

"Like he has any reason to listen to you!" Teresa said. "Like you're going to talk your way out of being already engaged."

"Oh come on!" Zac said. "It wasn't like the engagement was still _on_. I thought I was never going to see her again!"

"Were you going to make _me_ your official royal mistress?" Parvati demanded, crossing her arms.

Zac sort of had been, but he was six months old to the planet at the time and he didn't think he could be entirely blamed for his difficulties assimilating. Still, he wasn't going to get anywhere with the girls with that reasoning. He lounged against the door frame instead, letting his head fall against his wrist. "Silver, you would have been my _queen_."

"Well, _Stalker's_ not going to be your queen, jerk," Teresa said, picking up an empty bag of Doritos off the floor and crumpling it into a ball. "And you'd better find some way of making it up to him before he freaks out and quits again."

Zac threw up his hands. "Okay look, that was so not my fault! And I brought him back, didn't I? Why am I always the bad guy? And also, did it ever occur to either of you that maybe I'm going through kind of a _thing_ here, kind of in some conflict, and could maybe use some emotional support?"

Parvati and Teresa turned to each other in wordless, feminine conference. They were so smart, these girls, so fearless with their scars and bra straps showing. What would it be like to stop fighting beside them?

Teresa thrust the half-empty ice cream carton at him. "Here," she said. "Emotional support." Parvati slammed the door.

It was Phish Food, at least. That was something. He ate spoonfuls absently as he wandered his way to put it back in the freezer.

Zac had spent years thinking the Commando Tower was amazing, in no small part because it was a space uniquely and entirely theirs. But also because in many ways it was the one place in his life that had the freedom to be in shambles. Zac, underneath the aristocratic trappings, had never been a guy obsessed with quality. The Commandos had helped him define himself as _guy_ in the first place, not a prince or a hero, or if so one comfortable in sweatpants. They had taught him there could be variations on majesty and how a laugh could be more contagious than an insult. For years he had been stupidly grateful for that understanding. Now, though, opening the freezer to see bags and bags of mozzarella sticks, Zac felt his stomach roil in something too tired to be disgust. Plebeism felt a lot less comforting after being dunked, however briefly, in Lucratiann culture again. Everything on Lucratia had been exquisitely designed and refined over millenia into effortless, elegant perfection. The Tower now seemed tacky and small, trying too hard in order to make up for how it had no idea how to try in the right direction.

Zac felt restless, itchy in his skin. He closed the refrigerator door and went to the launch bay, leaving a quick note before he took off. As he broke through the cloud barrier the world was, for a moment, blissfully white.

***

Susan was smoking on the back porch. The sun was just beginning to set, red and orange and the only lush thing in Idaho. Susan swatted a bug on her arm and stared off at the green heads of the corn with an expression halfway between meditative and annoyed. She choked on her inhale when she saw Zac hovering above her head, before blowing out the smoke in one long, resigned breath. "You didn't see anything."

"Never do," Zac said.

She stubbed out her cigarette. "Not having fun with your buddies this weekend?"

He landed next to her. The warped wood of the porch creaked. "I'm going back. I just wanted to... is Uncle Pat here?"

She stood up, wiping imaginary dirt off her jeans. "He's at the new property." She added meaningfully. "Digging out stumps."  
"Oh," Zac said, taking off again. "Whups."

The new property had been a gift from Mr. Murphy, who had grown up with Uncle Pat's adopted parents and handed over the deed at their funeral. "I'm getting too old to keep it up properly anymore," he had said, shaking his head while Pat's bloodshot eyes refilled with the threat of tears. "Got all overgrown. George and Phyllis would have wanted it to stay local. And hell, boy, you're like a son to me, with how close we all were. I know you'll make that land worth something again." Zac would go on to blame that speech directly for the next few miserable months. It was Uncle Pat's final impetus for uprooting them all in an unorthodox variation of his unending desire to save the dying and the fallen.

Littleton wasn't a kitten in a tree though, or even as gloriously complicated a system as the Earth. It was just another victim of social evolution, and even Paragon couldn't do much to combat agribusiness. As for Grandma Phyllis and Grandpa George, faulty breaks were outside Uncle Pat's jurisdiction as well.

When Zac flew to the field, Uncle Pat didn't see him at first, preoccupied tugging out a stump as wide around as a small table. A shovel lay forgotten on the ground next to him. He wiped the sweat off his forehead, an unnecessary tic Zac found himself picking up too, and looked up in surprise when Zac cleared his throat. "The Commandos in trouble?"

"Nah, it's a quiet night," Zac said. "I just wanted, er, to talk?"

"Well, okay," Uncle Pat said guardedly. "Sit down." He settled on a stump, hands on his knees.

Zac straddled one of his own. "So... weird day."

Pat chuckled ruefully. "You can say that again."

"I've got a big decision to make."

Pat just nodded, for once not giving anything away.

Zac scuffed his foot against the ground. "The Commandos don't think I should go."

"By the Commandos, do you mean Stalker?" Pat asked cautiously, and oh god, he was _blushing_.

Zac snorted. "That spaz went AWOL. I don't know what he wants." He looked at Pat. "What do you think I should do?"

It took Pat a second to respond. "To be honest, Zac, I'm pretty hesitant to let you go."

"Uh, you wouldn't be _letting_ me do anything, _Patrick_ ," Zac said. "And come on! I would have thought _you'd_ understand! I've got a free pass to go home!"

Pat sighed, wrinkles forming at the corners of his mouth. "Zac. Lucratia isn't a very safe place for either of us."

"Okay, you hold a grudge, I get that, they weren't awesome to you," Zac said, feebling gesticulating to illustrate this sentiment. "But I figure this is my chance to _fix_ that! I can undo all the corruption and crap - stuff. I can make Lucratia _good_ again! All peaceful, and part of the federation of planets and everything."

Pat shook his head. "That's easier said than done."

Zac bristled. "What, you don't think I can? You don't think I'm smart enough?"

"I didn't say that. Zac, you're sixteen. How smart you are has nothing to do with it," Pat said, which meant _yes_. "It comes down to your level of experience."

Zac stood up. "Maybe you forgot but before you dragged me away from home and tried to make me learn _geometry_ , I had been training all my life to be a good ruler!"

"The way I remember it, I wasn't so much dragging you as offering you asylum after you were banished," Pat said, his temper obviously fraying. "And the reason I'm concerned, Zac, has nothing to do with _you_. The same forces that tried to kill me and cast us _both_ out are still working behind the scenes."

"My dad is _dead_ ," Zac said. "And thanks for being so comforting about that, by the way. God forbid you ever say sorry or ask how I feel or anything. And I can handle Owei."

Pat looked stricken, like he always did when he realized he had made a mistake, and then his face gentled awkwardly as he chose his next words. "Zac. Do you think it was a coincidence that Marialle and Owei are working together now?"

Zac took a step back. "What are you talking about?"

Pat stood up too, hands coming forward like he was placating an unstable rogue. "I think we should go back to the house. Nightmare and I have compiled some data on Marialle that I think you should see."

"She came with Owei to get me because she's my _mother_ ," Zac said. "She loves me! I don't know what you're talking about."

Pat dropped his hands. "Zac... I know this isn't easy to hear, believe me. But we have good reason to think that Marialle was working with Owei and your father to have me framed for attempting to assassinate Col and executed then, and is probably working with Owei now. I'm sure she wants you back, but maybe partly as a figurehead for their regime."

Zac could feel his heartbeat in his throat. It made it hard to breathe. "How can you say that? She's your _sister_."

"She stood by when your father imprisoned me. And when he exiled you. That's not very sisterly."

"She's family," Zac's voice rose, like Pat just couldn't hear the idea at a normal decibal. "They love you! That's not how you treat family!"

"My real family was George and Phyllis," Pat said. "They treated me with love and respect, and that's why we're in Littleton now, to honor their memories. If Marialle and Owei were ever my siblings, they stopped being them a long time ago."

"Yeah, well, then I guess I'm not your real nephew," Zac said. He was crying abruptly somehow; he could feel tears running hot and messy down his face and he wiped them away angrily. "I don't believe you. You don't know Mom. She's not like that at all. You just want to keep me here on this stupid mudhole of a planet so I can be a _nothing_ and a _freak_ to make _you_ feel better about how you weren't good enough for Lucratia! And it kills you that they want me back because they don't want _you_! No one ever wanted you and I don't either!"

"Zac!" Pat said. He sounded startled, angry like it was a patch over a wound, but Zac was already in the air, windsheer drowning out anything else Pat could have to say.

***

Zac circumnavigated the planet three times as fast as he could go, the continents blending into the ocean to create a marbled mosiac below him, bold colors flashing. He landed back in Littleton, heart racing and lungs like knives, but still had too much energy for anything but punching a tree out of the ground towards the general direction of Main Street. The root structure left a crater in the earth, a little warren that reminded Zac of a Lucratiann birthing grove. He hovered down inside it and sat Indian style, head in his hands, and cried. He hadn't cried when his father had disinherited him for saving his uncle's life. That had become the blueprint for all the thousand disappointments that followed in the strangeness of his new home, every single time Zac was once again reminded that his best was not nearly good enough. Now there was nothing else left to do, alone in a shallow hole that used to be symbolic of a new beginning and now seemed more like a grave.

Eventually the sky cooled off, the air loosing the humidity of the day, and Zac heard the exhausted growling of their ratty old pick-up. He looked up, wiping snot off his face and saw the car park and the door open. Susan got out, teetering across the muddy ground in her high heels.

"Hey, kiddo," she said. Anyone else would have just kicked off her pumps, but that wasn't Susan's style.

Zac hiccuped, trying to regain his composure. "How'd you know I was here?"

Susan pointed to the sky. "Just followed the light. You must have been pretty upset. It looked like an air raid over here, honestly. The town's freaking out."

"Yeah, well. I'm not sorry," Zac said sullenly.

Susan sighed. "I didn't say you should be. Mind if I join you?"

Zac settled more firmly in his hole. "It's a free country."

"Well, that's debatable." Susan finally got to the crater and sat down at the edge, swinging her feet like a little kid at the level of Zac's head. "Pat told me about your mom. That was a real light show back there too. Sounds like you really laid into him, huh?"

Zac just looked down at his shoes.

Susan sighed again, running her hand through her hair. "God, I remember when Pat first brought you home. You were such a little cuss, you know that? So arrogant. But you were scared to death, too. To tell you the truth, so were we. Pat and I had spent years arguing over whether or not we should even have a _baby_ and then there you were, twelve and opinionated. We had no idea what we were doing." She pursed up the side of her mouth. "I'm sure you picked up on that."  
Zac looked up. After a second he nodded gingerly.

"Yeah," Susan said. She stared off into the distance. "You were right, you know."

Zac rubbed his nose. "What?"

"This morning. You were right. I _hate_ Littleton."

Zac sort of laughed, wet and broken. "There's no Thai, of course you hate it."

"There's no _anything_ ," said Susan. "But Pat's still grieving for his parents and I am too, honestly. So I made a compromise, because that's what you do in a marriage. Sometimes you take on a burden because it's what your partner needs. I never really tried to be a mom to you. I didn't think that's what you needed. But in case you decide to go, I just want you to know that you weren't that kind of burden to me, Zac. I hope you'll remember me at least as an aunt, not just someone you were stuck with for a while. I guess... I guess I just want you to know that I love you."

Zac made another embarassing hiccuping noise. He had to squeeze his eyes shut hard before he could say, "Can we just sit here for a while?"

Susan shrugged. "Sure."

Zac flared his nimbus on, just enough to light the field so the colors were present but grainy as the last of the sunset dwindled out. "I'd keep in touch. When I went. If I went."  
Susan fished out her cigarettes, an ironic twist to her mouth. "Good. It would break your uncle's heart if you didn't."

***

Zac made it back to the Commando Tower in the small hours of the night. It was quiet the way a hospital goes quiet at night, a temporary and vaguely menacing lull in an otherwise busy ecosystem. Zac incinerated the note he left and tried Stalker's room again. His passcode worked but Stalker still wasn't there. Zac was losing his patience for this.

No one in the command center either, but Zac had to give Stalker more credit than that. He pulled up schematics of the Tower's ventilation system, printed them out and, map in hand, followed the tubes. Alone, he had the indulgence to fly through the hallways, which was also conveniant in that his footsteps would have echoed and interfered with any of the soft, human sounds he was searching for.

There was a heartbeat in the observation deck, steady and sweet, the blood pressure of someone preoccupied. Zac flew up, measured the distance, and calmly punched through the ceiling. Stalker had told him once that it wasn't even practical to make the ventilation system large and strong enough to support a person's weight, Zac remembered as he heard a cry, half startled, half angry. He ripped the hole open wider and smiled with grim satisfaction as a tumble of kevlar and latex fell out. The tunnels were as much an emergency plan as everything else Stalker thought of, just one more product of a lifetime's worth of obsession with the potential for disaster.

Stalker landed in a crouch, one foot splayed out and his back arched like an interrupted cat. He still had some sort of tool in his hand that beeped indignantly until he switched it off. His gaze flickered up to Zac and he sighed, resigned and dignified in his defeat. Stalker tucked the gadget away like he was knocking over his king. "Hi."

Zac beamed. "Heya, pumpkin."

"I was checking the motion and thermal detectors," Stalker said. "So thanks for _destroying them_."

"You were avoiding me," Zac said, landing on the carpet.

Stalker opened his mouth as if to speak but closed it again. His shoulders slumped slightly, and he pulled off his mask. Even in the peripheral lights lining the carpeted walkway of the observatory, Zac could see the circles under his eyes practically cutting grooves into his skin. It made him look less tired and old than it did sickly, like a junkie. Stalker rubbed his forehead. "I needed some time alone to think. I assumed you did too."

Zac scratched at his ear. "I guess I should apologize for not telling you about Mifann-Wi."

"Zac, don't," Stalker said sharply. Or maybe it was Elias. His hair was a mess. 

"Why not?" Zac said. "It wasn't... our relationship isn't anything real. We were engaged two days after she was born. She was my best friend growing up, but we weren't really... anything."

"She didn't seem to think so," Stalker said. He didn't sound spiteful or sullen, just pointing out fact. He went to one of the tables and sat down. "I always knew this was absurd," he continued, softly as if to himself, staring out the window at the city glittering below them, teaming with life and inscrutable from this distance. "There was no way this could last."

"You can come with me," Zac blurted out. Stalker turned to look at him, the movement sharp as a bird's, and he made himself keep going. "I mean... not as a _jurgash_ if you don't want, but as... I don't know. Just Stalker. We'll need a cape or two, to help out with the new regime. I could make you part of the cabinet."

Stalker's lip twitched up, but Zac was hesitant to classify it as a smile. He looked like Zac had confirmed something he already knew. "So you're definitely going then."

"I didn't say that," Zac said, exasperated. He went to sit across the table from Stalker, who pointedly continued gazing outside. "I don't know what I should do. Either way I lose out on something."

"Either way you win something too," Stalker said. "I guess you just need to decide which one would give you the better gain."

Zac lounged back. "Listen to you. You always know everything. You're the smartest guy I know, Stalker. You always make the right choice. You... you tell me what you think I shoud do, and I'll do it."

Stalker blinked, as if it were taking a minute for the information to percolate. He pinched the bridge of his nose, closing his eyes. Stalker had a way of making every action look world-weary, like he was up against impossible odds, even in the rare times he wasn't. "Don't ask me to make this decision for you, Zac. It's not fair."

"Why not?"

"You'll resent me whatever I decide," Stalker said. "And besides..." He clenched his jaw, turning back to the glass.

Zac edged closer to him. "What?"

Stalker was quiet for a moment. When he spoke again his voice was flat, the robot-voice. "You were at my house. You noticed my dad's not around, right? He left my mom after Michael died. They never got along that great, but with Michael they had someone to bring them together. He was a sports star, a drama star, everyone liked him. They were united in how proud they were of him. Their marriage wasn't strong enough to survive his death. It would have survived mine."

Zac had no idea what to say. He hadn't gotten to this chapter of the boyfriend manual yet. "I'm sure that's not true. Come on."

Stalker shrugged one shoulder. "That's what my dad told me before he left. He'd been drinking, but..." Stalker shrugged again. "My mom's barely holding it together. She's trying, but every day's a struggle. Because the wrong son died."

Zac stared at the table. Stalker cleared his throat. "You have the chance to have a family again. My family's gone. I'll never get it back. I can't in good conscience ask you to throw away yours."

Stalker made sure you knew he was smart. And Zac had always at least suspected that he was beautiful. But maybe Zac had found this weird, smug kid so compelling because he sensed, through one of those mysterious frequencies of instinct, that Stalker was profoundly ruined too, and here was the beating heart of it. The Commandos were nothing if not a confederation of freaks; and the two of them, echoes of the greatest men in the world, were entirely dissimilar and incomprehensible to everyone in the world but each other.

"Whatever I decide," Zac said. "Don't ever think you don't have a family."

Stalker looked at him, startled. He didn't resist when Zac pulled him in, snarled into Zac's mouth a little, maybe, but clung to him tight. Zac felt so heavy with this he could die from it.

"My room's closer," Stalker said, already working on disarming his own uniform. There were times his eminent practicality was a real disadvantage, but then again, there were times it wasn't.

***

The windows in all the Tower bedrooms were programmed to allow in the light incrementally, in order to wake the sleepers up as apologetically as possible. In emergencies the klaxons went off, obviously, but most Saturday mornings Zac was woken up by the sun or the twins bickering in Hindi or, within the past year, Stalker leaving. Zac was so used to a sudden redistribution of weight in the intimate dawn that he noticed Stalker, blanketing him naked and warm, before he really registered the shrieking.

"Oh my god!!" Graham repeated, staggering back and clumsily pawing at his eyes. "I am _so sorry_ And _blind_. Oh _my god_."

Stalker lifted his head from Zac's chest, myopically turtle-like. "Whuh?"

Zac sighed and rubbed Stalker's back. One of these days they were going to have a conversation about how Stalker needed needle drugs to cope with the innocent potential of a new morning. "You need anything, Graham?"

Graham slowly lowered his hands, red as a burn, eyes darting nervously away from all the exposed skin and back again. "Uh, yeah. There's a call coming through the command center for you. You wern't in your room, so I figured..." He did his best to avoid staring at Stalker's ass, morbidly fascinated and somehow still resentful.

"Thanks," Zac said, letting he head fall back on the pillow. "We'll be there in a minute."

"Yeah," Graham said shakily and turned to leave.

"Hold up," Stalker said. Zac had thought he had fallen back asleep, but he was climbing off the bed with something like his regular coordination. He stood up. Graham turned around reluctantly. Stalker crossed his arms without any apparent discomfort in his nudity. The gesture just made a square of his frame. The knotted cords of his muscles were jarring next to his dishevelled hair and the hickey on his ribcage. "Graham. Anything you want to say to me?"

Graham shook his head frantically, saucer-eyed at the wall behind the bed. "No. Not really, no."

"I'm back on the team for good," Stalker continued. "You got a problem with that?"

"No!" Graham yelped. "No, it's cool. Welcome back aboard?"

Stalker tilted his head, studying him briefly before he let his arms fall to his sides. "Cool. Catch up with you later."

"Yeah," Graham said just before bolting out the door.

"Dude," Zac said, rolling over on his side and kicking off the last dregs of the blankets. "Oh man. Poor guy. You freaked the hell out of him."

"Guess I forgot to lock the door last night." Stalker turned to smile at him, smug and oddly shy. "Oops."

"You did that on purpose?" Zac said, tugging on his wrist.

Stalker fell back on the bed. "He's usually the one Brian sends as message boy. I figured this would be the easiest way to confront him."

"You are such an evil mastermind sometimes," Zac marvelled, face in Stalker's hair. "I love you."

Stalker froze, profoundly, like an adrenal command. And Zac remembered belatedly that he might have said that in his head a bunch, but it had never quite made that significant external transition. He made himself keep calmly nosing Stalker's hair, which smelled like peppermint today for some reason.

Stalker finally drew back, paler than usual. "What you said last night, do you still mean it? If I say stay, you'd stay?"

Zac said hoarsely, "Yeah."

Stalker looked down at the intersection of their bodies and back up at Zac. "You wouldn't have asked me if you weren't hoping I'd be selfish," he said finally. "So I'm going to be. Stay."

Oh. So that was it then. He hadn't known what he had been hoping for, exactly, just that any ultimatum Stalker gave wouldn't feel this much like a prison sentence. Zac looked down too, swallowing. "Yeah," he heard himself say. "Okay."

"Okay?" parroted Stalker, brows drawn. "What's that mean, okay?"

"What does okay ever mean?" Zac said, picking some grime out from under his thumbnail. "It means okay. I keep my word."

And just like that, any fledgling vulnerability in Stalker's face vanished. He stood up again, a masterpiece of non-expression. "See? I knew this would happen."

"Nothing's happening!" Zac said, sounding irritable even to himself. "I said I would stay."

"Yeah. Sure. I'm getting a call, anyway," Stalker said, flicking on his comm. "You should just go answer yours."

"Whatever," Zac muttered, still little bewildered about the direction the moment had taken and hopping into his pants on his way out the door. He found he didn't want to keep looking at Stalker so much. "Have fun injecting yourself with _needle drugs_."

Zac wandered his way to the command center in his pajama pants, walking in hopes that the impact would shake off some of the lingering unresolved tension. He felt a little shaky, like the exchange had been some sort of definitive punctuation, but still, deep in his bones, well-laid. When he got to the room Graham was somehow still red over at the console with Brian, and the girls were going through the motions of arguing over a croissant. They stopped abruptly when they saw Zac, which was gratifying even in the middle of all this. He gave them a smile and swooped in to grab the croissant. "Morning, ladies."

Parvati made a show of studying her split ends to cover up how her eyes had immediately fallen to nipple level. "You're being hailed."

"Paragon?" Zac asked, chewing.

Teresa was baldly eyeing the cut of his groin muscle, eyebrows raised, somewhere between intrigued, scandalized and amused. "No. The Lucratiann Flagship."

Zac swallowed dryly. "Oh."

"The frequency's lit up," Teresa said. She turned to Parvati. "This is what I was talking about. It's always the cute ones who end up being off limits."

"I'm _right here_ ," Graham shrilled.

"Aw, Wielder," Zac said absently, mosying over to him and Brian. "Ain't no shame in having a great personality."

Graham jabbed a button vindictively as Brian sniggered. "Just answer the goddamn phone, Captain Shmuck."

Zac grinned at them, all teeth, but didn't put up a fight when Brian grimly handed him one of his extra shirts. He had never really approved of Zac dating his sister, never less so then when it became clear he was never going to marry her. Zac turned on the screen while tugging it over his chest. He could sense the tension behind him, the other Commandos pantomiming their normal, sleepy-savory routine while jacked up to high alert.

It was Mifann-Wi calling, sitting down with her perfect posture, the blue accents of her collar glittering against the lines of her throat. She smiled tentatively at him. "Zacir. How are - you're doing well this morning?"

Zac ignored the whispering to the left of him. "Good. I'm good. You... uh... sleep well?"

She touched her temple, miming a wry sort of headache or inner turmoil. "I've had better."

Zac winced slightly. He definitely heard Graham mutter something that ended with '...tap that.' "Sorry."

"You still apologize when you don't have to, you bird brain," she said. "I'm glad to see it."

The idea of receiving a compliemnt from anyone he might be sexually interested in had become something of a dimestore novelty, unexpected in an adult life and adorably quaint. It made him smile at Mifann-Wi, and only when her own expression shifted to discomfort did he become aware that Stalker was standing next to him, in full uniform, his mouth a chiseled groove in his face.

Zac cleared his throat. "So what's up?"

Mifann-Wi couldn't take her eyes off Stalker. "Your... your honored mother and I were hoping that you would break the fast with us." When Stalker raised an eyebrow she hurried to add, "Your friends too, of course. We're both looking forward to meeting them."

"Beacon, I need to talk to you for a second," Stalker said, still staring at Mifann-Wi like he was hypnotizing a cobra.

"Now?" Zac asked.

"Yes," Stalker said emphatically. "Now. Sorry," he said, turning to Mifann-Wi, all brusquely, falsely pleasant. "Commando business. The Wielder, Sterling, why don't you fill her in on what the Commandos are all about while Beacon and I have our conference."

Before anyone could express an opinion about Stalker's version of the immediate future, he had grabbed Zac by the elbow and dragged him off to the lounge.

Zack tugged his arm away, trying his best not to hurt Stalker in the process. "Dude. I understand you need seconds, but time and place, you know?"

Stalker stood tall, entirely curtained by his cape. It was a pose Zac had been conditioned to associate with intense dread or a sudden and overwhelming adrenaline rush. "We shouldn't get on that ship."

"What? Why not?"

Stalker took a breath like he was stalling for time while he figured out what to say. Zac was getting pretty sick of people making that gesture lately. "That was Nightmare calling me just now. He told me some things he and Paragon had been uncovering about the House of Fahn that were pretty suspicious. I don't think-"

"Jesus, you too?" Zac said. "This is such bullshit. I already said I'd stay, what more do you want?"

Stalker's eyes narrowed. "This isn't about that." 

"Isn't it? What, I shouldn't have a chance to say goodbye to my family either?"

Stalker was calcifying by the second. "Don't put words in my mouth."

"Because I let _you_ have your little spaz about Null," Zac continued."So maybe you could let me say goodbye _forever_ to my mom and my best friend."

Stalker cracked, snapped into animation. "I can't believe you just said that! This is nothing like what happened with Nulll! She moved to Baltimore and we weren't even together."

Zac crossed his arms. "Not together like _we_ weren't dating for eight months? For someone who's asking for a ton of commitment you're sure not showing a great track record on your end. Although with _Heather_ you probably didn't tap that, because that's a lot of _touching_ , isn't it?"

Stalker blushed below his mask; Zac was mildly surprised he was even capable of it. "Screw you."

"I can't believe you'd trust Nightmare over me!" Zac said. "Where'd he get his intel from, Paragon? The hubble? Yeah, those are real accurate sources. I know my mom, man! You can't stop me from seeing her."

Zac had baited Stalker recreationally for years, but there was a difference between prodding sore spots and drawing blood. Stalker looked anemic now, and endlessly angry. Zac realized, treacley once the rush had worn off, they weren't recovering easily from this.

"Do whatever you want," Stalker spat, and stormed out.

Zac trailed him back to the control center, where Mifann-Wi's perplexion at Graham and Brian's awkward babble was magnified tenfold by the size of the console screen. Stalker didn't even look aside form his trajectory, shoulders hunched forward as he moved. "The Wielder, Silver. You're with me."

"-From the govenor of Illinois," Graham finished. He gave Mifann-Wi a regretful look. "Sorry, ma'am. Bossman calls."

Zac turned to the screen, plastering a smile on his face. Out of the corner of his eye he could see Silver and the Wielder falling into step behind Stalker, Sterling and Falconette exchanging uncertain and significant glances. Let them. "Sorry about that."

"Not at all," Mifann-Wi said. "Your teammates are... fascinating."

"Like a research experiment," Zac said, loudly enough that Stalker could hear it from where was was disappearing through the door. "Anyway, yeah. We'd love to have breakfast with you. _All_ of us."

***

The dining room was spartan compared to the one in the palace, the ceilings curved but not domed, the long table in the center wood, not stoned, but the Commandos, staggered around it, still looked vaguely uncomfortable. Mifann-Wi and Marialle were dressed lightly, for travel, and Owei was thoughtfully absent. Zac wouldn't have been able to eat with him very graciously. The technology responsible for the watercolor shifting of the walls was used sparingly to conserve fuel. Zac was glad to see it had been employed this morning, green shades mostly. Pampering. It was also nice to see the other Commandos so plainly wowed by the equivelant of wood paneling in a yacht. Except for Stalker, storm-faced, who made a habit of never being impressed by anything. Zac decided to ignore him, which honestly wasn't that hard. "Tsungi lungs!" he said as the dish was uncovered in front of him.

"Lungs?" The Wielder echoed. The twins, vegetarians to begin with, made identical expressions of horror.

"Yes," Marialle said, polite and patient. "They're my little bird's favorite."

"Aw, Mom," Zac said, half-heartedly batting at her as she tweaked his ears. She settled for smoothing over his hair, her hand smooth and cool.

"Why do you call him that?" Sterling asked.

"That's what Zacir means," Mifann-Wi said. She touched his elbow. "It's a bird of prey."

"The morning hunter," Marialle elaborated, returning to her seat.

"Ha, could stand to take after that more, Zac," Falconette said, tucking her ringlets behind her ears. "You can't pay him to get out of bed before noon most days."

"Hey, okay, you see me on weekend time," Zac said. "That is totally different from normal time. When I am a model citizen in all ways."

"Oh great, here we go, Zac time," The Wielder said. "I just wish there was a Zac time that was laundry time."

"You should feel _privileged_ to smell me," Zac said, biting into a lung. It tasted more like cinnamon than he remembered. Good, but he was disappointed that the experience wasn't more unique.

Marialle laughed into her sleeve. "Excuse me," she said, quieting down. "But it's so good to see you've made friends here, Zacir. I was so worried you would be lonely."

It was Zac's first instinct to dig his heels in, tap into that infected, oozing loneliness. But then he watched the Wielder trying to steal Falconette's berry platter and she, in turn, trying to stab his hand with her fork, and there wasn't any sense of loneliness there. Unhappiness, sure, shame and culture shock and star-devouring regret, but of all the tempests he'd weathered on earth, isolation had never been one of them. Paragon had called a press conference the week after he had moved in with them to California. "This is my nephew," he had said to the media, curious and pointilist from where Zac could see them from his podium. "He's a hero."

"Earth was pretty welcoming," Zac said, finally. Down the table, out of the corner of his eye, he saw Stalker looking at him.

Marialle patted his hand. "Well, all your friends are more than welcome to visit you when you're home."

It was such a throwaway comment, so polite, and that vibrated wrong in Zac's teeth. That it was just a matter of etiquette that she would say that. Zac put down his fork. "You know, Mom... I still haven't made up my mind."

"What, little bird?" she asked, helping herself to more _surerart_.

Around him he saws the other Commandos exchange mutedly excited looks, except for Stalker, who had gone back to steadfastedly staring at his plate.

Zac toyed with his napkin. "About leaving. I... it was all I wanted for such a long time. But I've made a home here too, and I don't know, I've been thinking about destiny and how much of it you make yourself and-"

"Darling, what are you talking about?" Marialle asked, thankfully shutting him up.

Zac swallowed. "I just think I need more time to decide than just a few days. Maybe a couple weeks?"

"We don't have a couple weeks," his mother said, a thread of steel spinning its way into her tone. "I don't think you understand, Zacir. Giving you a day to say goodbye was incredibly generous of your uncle and me."

"I thought you said you were giving me time to make up my mind," Zac said, soft and surprised at how wounded. Across from him, Falconette had started to flutter her wings.

Mifann-Wi looked around at the collected Commandos, all in various states of tense preparation. "Maybe we should have this conversation in private."

"No!" Zac said. "Why does everything have to be behind closed doors? They're family too."

"Family?" Marialle said. Her mouth wrinkled and Zac had a jolting visceral reaction to the lines that formed there. "You're calling them _family_? Then yes, Zacir. Let me say this in front of your _family_. I had assumed yesterday that you were simply finding a kind way to delay your departure until you had wrapped up your business here. It never occured to me that you could want to _stay_ on your uncle's wretched little backwater."

Silver - sweet, complicated Silver - looked particularly shocked, caught in mid-bite by the naked ugliness of the moment. Zac gripped his armrest hard. He'd been so angry the last few days, lashing out with all the writhing imprecision of an untended hose, but somehow, now, however surreally, the deserving target seemed clear. "My uncle and my friends on this _backwater_ haven't ever _abandoned_ me. So yeah, I'm gonna need more time to make up my mind."

And the look on his mother's face, a face that used to be the first thing he saw in the morning even before the sun, could pierce worlds. Could destroy the hope of renewal. But then the expression crumbled, smoothed over into a professional mask. "I suppose it can't be helped then," she said. "Owei?"

The door slid open so quick it was like a step in a dance. Owei stepped forward, robes immaculate and a dark, dark blue. "Yes?"

Marialle gestured, elegant and vague. "You were right."

"He was?" Graham squeaked. "Oh, I don't like the idea of him being right."

Owei ignored this, fishing a small metal ball out of his sleeve. "You should learn not to doubt me, sister," he said, pressing down on it with his thumb. "I know the boy's character."

"Hey, wait - what about my character, what's going on-" Zac said, but then he heard the unmistakable whirr, the sound from the prison camps that had rattled him through the spine at twelve, that haunted his uncertain moments now. He rose out of his chair and slammed into nothing. "What the fuck!"

Mifann-Wi looked around astonished as the other Commandos met the same invisible, implaccable resistance. "Your Excellency, what is this?"

"There'd better be a good explanation!" Sterling said, throwing metal spears against the field around him only to have them blunt and clatter uselessly to the ground.

"Particle cages," Marialle said, almost off-handidly. "Zacir is familiar with them. This whole mess started when he freed Telar from one. You realize your father was held responsible for your mistakes unless he disinherited you," she added to Zac. "And then you had to go and commit high treason. Freeing a convicted attempted assassin. Our hands were tied."

Zac had his own hands braced against the shield and curled them into fists. "Paragon wasn't planning to kill Dad and you know it."

"Of _course_ he wasn't," she snapped. "But the Bastard child of your grandfather, the Old King? With that much charisma? He could have lead millions, destroyed the entire dynasty. We weren't about to let that happen."

Zac felt something large and sour build in his throat. "You knew?"

She looked at him with pity. "Darling. Of course I knew. Owei, inform the captain we're disengaging from orbit. Set a course for Lucretia."

Noise exploded from the Commandos. "Wait, no, _what_?" Falconette said. "You can't just take us!"

Marialle's mouth curled up. "It's regrettable. You're certainly not the war trophies I would have hoped for. But Zacir must return home now."

"This is kidnapping," Stalker said calmly. He was standing in the exact center of his forcefield, a wall behind his cape.

"Yeah!" Zac said, pounding fruitlessly against the cage. "I'm not going to just let you drag me and my friends away!"

"Oh," said Owei. "Like we could have forgotten. You have _powers_ on this planet. Of course we prepared the structural integrity of the cages for that. And maybe you don't remember, but," a nimbus flared out around him. "So do we."

Marialle's features softened, solemn. She went over to Zac, all pale skin and calm eyes. His first imprint of love. "My morning bird," she said, sad and strong. "I worked too hard and too long to have your father removed for you not to come home."

It was like she was talking in another language, syllables bloody and sharp. Zac felt himself go slack against the walls of the cage, numb as if from venom. "You... you did it. You killed him."

Mifann-Wi gasped, silently.

"Don't look at me like that," Marialle said irritably. "It was the only way you could return home and reclaim the throne in the name of Fahn! A _Sto_ wasn't going to rule!"

"She just arranged the circumstances that lead to the duel," Owei said priggishly. "I was the one who slipped Col the tranquilizers that morning."

"And now Hren _will_ have the most legitimate claim to the throne if you're not there," Marialle said. "So you see how imperative it is for you to return as soon as possible."

"I don't care!" Zac said, choked voice coming from somewhere hidden but fierce. Around him the Commandos were doing their best to cut or force their way out of their cages without success. "You're all crazy! This isn't right! You can't make me be emperor if it means ruling like _this_ , as your freaking _puppet_."

"You're sixteen," Marialle said. "And influenced by your uncle. You'll grow up and get over it."

Beneath him, the floor began to hum. The thrusters had turned on. The ship was moving. Zac roared and threw himself against the cage again, instinctive and meaningless.

"Zac," Stalker said suddenly. "I need you to brace yourself, okay? You have to be strong now."

Zac lifted his head. "What?"

"Just stay with me," Stalker said. "You can do that for me, can't you? Just trust me."

Zac nodded gingerly.

Stalker nodded back, just once. He turned sharply on his heels, facing Graham. "Wielder. Your move."

Graham bit his lip and there was a flash, a sense of the air being distorted somehow, and he was holding his sword. Zac felt the nausea before he saw the blade, shaped like a scimitar and carved from yellow crystal.

Marialle doubled over in pain, clutching her stomach. Mifann-Wi whimpered, clutching her head and Owei was already on his knees, retching. "What... what have you done?" he gasped out.

"Release the forcefields now," Stalker said. "This is Lucrinianite, the one element in existence that when exposed to Earth's atmosphere is fatal to Lucretians. Release the forcefields and turn this ship around and the Wielder will take the sword away."

"What?" Owei hissed.

"You might have been prepared Lucratianns having increased powers on Earth, but I was betting you wouldn't be prepared for your increased weaknesses," Stalker said. The crystal was beginning to pulse; Zac staggered back against the cage walls. "The Wielder can manifest any possible sword, including one made out of Lucrinianite. I'm not going to say this again, _release the forcefields_."

"You... you wouldn't," Marialle gasped. "Zacir..."

"He's been exposed to it before. He's used to the effects," Stalker said. Zac was hearing him now like he was under water. "He'll last just that much longer than you. Which at this rate is five more seconds."

Marialle looked at Zac, her eyes growing bloodshot. Zac, shaking with the effort, put his palm against the resistance of the cage.

"Fine," she said, turning away. "Owei, do it."

Owei scrambled to find the sphere and pushed it. Immediately the nothing around Zac became immaterial again and he fell to the ground. He started coughing, tasting copper in the wetness there.

Graham was sweating bullets, arms shaking where they held the sword. "Stalker... I don't know how much longer I can hold this... it's really unstable..."

"Silver," Stalker barked, but she was already in motion, a sheet of iron folding itself into a box around the blade. Graham staggered back. Zac put his head down, weak and still coughing but no longer feeling the agony that meant his insides were liquidating. And then Stalker was there, his hands cradling Zac's head, the gloves rough against his skin. "Beacon. Beacon, talk to me."

"Uh, guys," Sterling said, forming a lance. "We've got guards."

Zac could see them, marching two abreast into the room, from where his head rested in Stalker's lap. He saw the others stand in front of him, forming a blockade, ready to fight. He closed his eyes.

And then he heard a ripping sound, an improbable and delirious crackle, and felt light against his face. He opened his eyes and Paragon was there, kneeling against the backdrop of the giant crater he had torn through the hull of the ship. "Can you get up?"

Relying heavily on his hands for support, Zac got to his feet. "Yeah."

"Then I need your help," Paragon said. Zac looked around but Stalker was already gone, gassing a guard off in the distance. "There are a lot of them."

Zac spat out the last of the blood and wiped his mouth on his sleeve. "Yeah." He saw a flash of blue-back against the green of the wall and narrowed his eyes. "I know where to start."

Owei floundered back when Zac flew up next to him, arms folded. His face twisted up in a snarl. "Traitor. Once a traitor always a traitor. You have no idea what it means to have honor."

Zac wasn't too surprised, really, in a distant way, that it only took one or two punches to knock Owei to the ground. "Coming from you, that's a compliment," he said. Zac hauled Owei up, his forearm against Owei's throat. "I have your captain!" He called out. "The rest of you, surrender now!"

It sounded almost like rain when all the weapons fell. Like the studio effects for Mifann-Wi's tears. Marialle's eyes, however, as she met his gaze while Paragon put her in restraints, were bone dry.

***

The Society handled the fallout. Nightmare was in charge, obviously.

"The real problem is what to do with Marialle and Owei," Stalker said, quietly. Everything he had said to Zac since the flagship had landed had been quiet, deferential, like he was afraid he was skating on thin ice. "It's pretty clear Mifann-Wi was in the dark about what they did to your father."

Zac had been preparing to fight for her innocence if he had to, but between the weeping and the desolated shouting, no one had the heart to accuse Mifann-Wi of a part in the conspiracy. She had composed herself after a short talk with Silver and now stood, complexion chalky but shoulders tall, talking directly to Nightmare. Stalker wouldn't meet her gaze either.

"Send them home with me," Mifann-Wi said. "They're royal prisoners now. They need to be tried in a court of their peers, in public, so all of Lucratia can bear witness. Too much of our politics have gone on behind closed doors. It's time the aristocracy became accountable to their word."

Nightmare did not react for a moment, his statue of justice routine, before he grunted and nodded swiftly. The Blue Peril and the Amazonian led Owei and Marialle back on the ship Sterling and Silver had spent most of the morning rebuilding.

Owei's face was still bruised and he was dragging his feet, but Marialle still moved with grace, her neck curved delicately. No true angles, that was Lucratiann perfection. She did not look up once as she boarded the ship and Zac watched her skirts billow around her like she was walking on a cloud, the highest of the high.

He stared down at his palms, where a branded seal of the House of Fahn wasn't and would never be, as the ship's hatch slid shut.

Mifann-Wi turned to him, tucking her arms in her sleeves. She was already carrying herself differently, less skittishly, like she had nothing to apologize for. "You can still come with me if you want. Lucretia still needs to be rebuilt. Hren's base among the middle class is weak, we can take a foothold easily from there, and they feed most directly into the Congress these days. Which needs to be entirely restructured."

Zac smiled sort of queasily. The image she painted seemed more from a pop-up book than anything he could apply to his life, and almost out of anything, that clinched it. "I don't think so. Besides, something tells me you're going to be a lot better at all that politics anyway. My specialty is punching stuff."

She looked resigned, a little wistful but a little relieved too. Like she had been expecting that. "Bird brain. I guess we're on different paths now, aren't we?"

"I think so."

She hugged him. "A part of me will always love you, Zacir."

Zac rested his chin on her head. Beside him, Stalker's mouth was pinched. He looked tired. "Take care of yourself, okay?"

She let go of him, sniffling a little, bravely, and smiled at Nightmare as he escorted her back on the ship. Nightmare kept himself a few steps behind her. Even he knew when it was proper to pay respect to the incumbent queen.

"Hey," Zac nudged Stalker's shoulder. "We need to talk."

Stalker looked pretty doleful about the idea. "Yeah, I know. Come on."

There wasn't ever a lot of privacy behind a police barricade, but they did their best, finding a little enclave created by the rubble. Zac had tried to land the crashing ship as best he knew how, but Kansas wasn't looking the better for it. Stalker looked like he was facing the firing squad.

"Look, okay," he said, the second Zac stopped moving. "That was my idea, not Graham's. He and Silver just went along with it. So yeah, that had been a backup plan for a while, but I never meant to use it against you, just in situations like this, other Lucratianns gone rogue. I really tried to avoid hurting you. I'm sorry."

"Huh?" said Zac.

"The Lucratianite," Stalker said. One of his hands was fidgeting at his utility belt.

"Oh yeah," Zac said. "That. Look, I take it for granted you've figured out a way to kill everyone you've ever met. Plus you were pretty pissed at me."

The defensiveness in Stalker's expression became replaced by something very peculiar. "Yeah," he said. "Sure. But still, you're not mad about that?"

Zac sighed. The sky was a ruddy color, plumed with smoke. Any other time he probably would have been angry about Stalker pulling that stunt, but now he felt like toothpaste tube used up and rung out. "I said some really dick things. To you _and_ Paragon. Let's just call it even." He added, when Stalker seemed unconvinced. "I'm not mad at _you_."

Stalker's expression changed again. He looked around, ever cautious, before disarming and removing his mask. He looked less jaundiced than he had the night before, riding the adrenaline. Color was high in his cheeks. "If it makes you feel better, I think she did all those things out of love."

"Love of power, maybe," Zac said. "Not me."

"You too," Stalker said. The distant, almost lazy whirlagig of sirens sounded a little like bird calls from here. "You know," Stalker continued after a moment. "There's this convention in Germanic and early Celtic and Anglo folklore."

"Oh, sure. Right. I'm all over that."

"No, shut up," Stalker said. "In a lot of stories, the young prince is sent out of his home to live with his mother's brother. His maternal uncle. It was his uncle who would raise him, teach him what it meant to be a man and a king. A hero. Their bond was closer than parent and child."

Zac stared at him. Stalker was giving him a small, weird sideways grin. He said, "You'll be okay."

Zac still felt a little rubbery, a lot raw. It wouldn't be as flippant a transition as a fairy tale. And he knew, somehow, that it started here in the middle of this pit that had once been a field, another in the long line of necessary destruction he left in his wake. They'd had princes once here too, who had become legend.

He said, "Even before I found out what was going on, I wouldn't have minded it, staying here for you."

Stalker raised an eyebrow and crossed his arms. "You know you're right, you were a pretty big dick about that. Starting next weekend you're going to have to really work on making me believe you mean it."

Zac was about to say something else, but Stalker looked up. Zac saw what he saw: a figure horizontal and silhouetted against the sun. "Beacon?" it called. Paragon's voice.

"Uh," Zac looked down, but Stalker had already disappeared, the little weasel. He swallowed down a lump and watched as Paragon landed. "Hey."

Pat's uniform was smudged with soot, charred in spots. "There you are," he said, jovial and transparently worried. He couldn't keep the bland expression up for long.

And lord, they had a lot to talk about; the fight, the future. Somehow, school was still going to be an issue, Zac just knew it. But right now, Zac was almost surprised at the simple relief he felt seeing his uncle, alive and as square as ever. Zac could crash against him a thousand times, in a thousand different ways, but he'd never wear away Pat's angles. He was a rock. "I guess... thanks for coming to rescue me."

Paragon looked surprised. "It turned out you didn't need much rescuing."

Zac said, "You still came."

"Well," Paragon said, like it was so simple. "You're family."

"I shouldn't have... well, I shouldn't have done a lot of stuff."

Paragon shrugged, all what-can-you-do. "We're both learning as we go. And... and you were right. I should have told you I was sorry your father died. You were there for me when mine did. I know how hard it can be."

Zac swallowed and rubbed the back of his neck. "Can we go home soon? I'm kind of tired. And we should pick up some Pad Thai for Susan."

Paragon put his hand on Zac's shoulder and squeezed. "Sure," he said. "She'll like that."


End file.
